Two Day Magazine

The word of the day is...

Okay everyone, (yes, that includes you, too), let's all say the word that make pre-teens giggle in sex ed class and intelligent adults make up silly soubriquets in order to avoid saying it. The word is: Vagina! Come on. It's okay. You can say it. It is a body part that has more nicknames than almost any other one (except for the penis).

Vagina is a classy word for an important area. It's not a 'va-jay-jay', not a 'down-there', not a 'hoo-ha', definitely not a V-G-G, certainly not a furtively whispered "uh, you know", and not any of the other made-up names we adults give this very functional, sexual, and healthy area of the female anatomy.

Even ob-gyns, who can give you a complete lesson on female genitalia from the labia majora and minora to the mons veneris, will often say something along the lines of, "Let's see what going on 'down-there'.

A remark like this prompted one quick-witted woman I know to say, (feet in stirrups and all), "Oh c'mon, doctor. You don't have to get down on the floor to examine my vagina. Please, make yourself comfortable and do it standing up!"

What makes normally forthright adults reticent to say the words vagina and penis? The mighty penis has as many pseudo-names as the mighty vagina, and really, it's time to stop.

If you're using 'cute' names for vagina and penis during sex-play, hey, that's okay and endearing. That's the time to be playful and sexy; whatever turns you on. We all do it.

The problem comes about when we adults use a pseudonym to describe it in every day polite conversation; as if saying the word 'vagina' itself somehow is cause for embarrassment. Why?  Truth be told I'm more embarrassed to say something like ‘va-jay-jay’ because I feel moronic. It is my vagina, not a fancy new yo-yo. Vagina it is and vagina it will stay whenever I have to use the word. (Except of course during ‘play-time’;)

And penis, please why can't we say the word penis in mixed company? It's a nice word, a healthy word, a strong masculine one. Let's use it as well as vagina. They fit well and have a long, happy history together.  

The word vagina comes from the Latin word vagĭna, literally meaning sheath or scabbard. Considering what the Latin meaning is for vagina, you'd think the Latin for penis would mean mighty sword, right? Scabbard, sheath, sword, get it? But no, the word penis actually means tail in the Latin translation. Interesting! Be that as it may, the origins of the words really don’t matter. No right thinking woman is going to call her vagina her scabbard and I highly doubt any sane man would refer to his penis as his tail. Anyway, Scabbard and Tail sound like names for new puppies.

So, if scabbard and tail are out, why not discard the other equally unreal terms we use to describe these parts? What’s wrong with using correct terminology? Let's not be embarrassed by parts of our bodies that give us so much pleasure, have an incredibly long shelf life, and whose health is crucial to our over-all well-being.

The evolution of any language has a great deal to do with the use of slang. Through the last 500 hundred years words used to describe genitalia have had more than their share of 'street words'. From the Puritan terminology of man-thing and woman-thing, to the 20th century private parts, to today's 'cute' expressions, the vagina and the penis has had a vast collection of  alter-egos.

Don't be embarrassed to say vagina or penis or even say them together in a sentence! Proper names are in vogue again; stand up and say those words in a proud, adult voice. Don't diminish their importance by giving them names that have no real relationship to them. Those names sound as if we're ridiculing our genitalia.

The vagina and penis deserve better, really they do.

© 2011 Copyright Kristen Houghton

Kristen Houghton is a Lifestyle writer and the author of the best-selling book, And Then I'll Be Happy! Stop Sabotaging Your Happiness and Put Your Own Life First